Week 4 - Miami Preview

Just like last week, I’ll begin by showing what we did wrong last year.  Once again, I am only showing what I consider to be egregious mistakes.  Things that could have been easily corrected, and had a significant impact on the game.  For most clips, I freeze frame the key portion, explain it, and then show the clip again with no interruption. 

This was probably our worst game of the season last year, in terms of execution.  Miami’s defense deserves some credit, but we did a lot of this to ourselves.  See below.

3 of these plays resulted in GT losing the ball.  Two were third downs, and both of these involved poor pitch reads.  On 3rd and 4, Tevin was under pressure immediately, but it appeared the pitch man might have had a chance to convert.  On a separate 3rd and 7 play, Tevin cut inside when we had only 1 defender on the outside, to defend Tevin plus Sims as the pitch man.  If Tevin cuts outside, we probably convert easily and it might have been much more.  Both of these plays occurred near midfield.  Finally, on 4th and 3 at Miami’s 30 yard line, we missed a pretty open 10 yard throw.  Should have been just pitch and catch, and our ball at Miami’s 20.  Instead, it was a turnover.  Think we could have used 3 extra possessions, 2 at midfield and 1 at Miami’s 20 yard line?  

Additionally, we got a bad break on Roddy’s long run.  Roddy stiff armed the defender’s facemask while the defender horse-collar tackled Roddy.  Both are 15 yard penalties.  Unfortunately, those offset, so the whole run was negated.  Had there been no penalties, we had a 40 yard gain to Miami’s 40 yard line.  If only Miami had committed the penalty, its our ball at their 25.  But the interesting part is, if only we had committed the facemask, its still our ball near midfield.  Instead, we end up with the ball at our own 20.  Basically, we were punished because Miami also committed a penalty.  I think they should change this rule, and give each team the option of declining the other team’s penalty.  If the result is better for us by declining their penalty and accepting our 15 yard penalty, I think we should be allowed to choose that option.  Miami should not benefit from committing a personal foul.  But effectively, that is what happened.  

So anyway, enough about last year.  If we execute that poorly again, we will probably lose.  But hopefully we execute well, or at least at a normal level.  

Miami at the moment does not look very good.  Especially on defense.  Boston College is not known as an offensive power, and yet Miami allowed them 537 total yards.  So far this season, Miami has been a very bad defense.  They’ve also been a bad rushing defense.  They gave up 233 yards to Bethune Cookman.  But, let me tell you why I don’t care about rushing defense stats.  Our offense is different from everyone else’s.  I mean, there is some variation between all offenses, but I think our rushing offense is different to a much larger degree.  And what that means is its hit or miss as to how we will perform against a “good” run defense or a “bad” run defense.  Because whether a run defense is good or bad is determined by the stats it compiles against everybody else, most of whom run the ball in a very different way from how we run it.  We sometimes have great days against good defenses, and bad days against bad ones.  And most every year, at least one pretty bad run defense shuts us down.  See below:

2008

Opponent	GT Rush Yards	Opponent Run Defense National Rank	Rank Among GT Opponents
Miami	472	72nd	8th
Miss St.	438	74th	10th
UGA	409	27th	4th
UNC	326	58th	7th
FSU	288	42nd	6th
VT	278	14th	2nd
Duke	224	75th	11th
Clemson	207	36th	5th
LSU	164	17th	3rd
BC	162	7th	1st
UVA	156	73rd	9th

So our best day was against the 8th toughest, and our worst was against the 9th toughest D we faced?  We lit up UGA (4th toughest) and struggled to run on Duke (11th toughest)??  

2009 

Opponent	GT Rush Yards	Opponent Run Defense National Rank	Rank Among GT Opponents
WF	412	82nd	10th
Vandy	404	105th	12th
FSU	401	108th	13th
UVA	362	95th	11th
Clem	333	67th	7th
UNC	317	10th	1st
VT	309	41st	5th
Duke	306	74th	9th
Clem	301	67th	7th
Miss St.	213	62nd	6th
UGA	205	36th	4th
Iowa	143	34th	2nd
Miami	95	31st	3rd

Aha!  Some order.  Well, sort of.  We had our four highest totals against the four worst defenses we face.  And our 3 worst were against the 2nd, 3rd and 4th toughest.  We did have the one game against UNC (the best run D we faced) where we put up one of highest totals all year.  But in 2009, we sort of made sense.  As you’ll see, this was the only year really.

Opponent	GT Rush Yards	Opponent Run Defense National Rank	Rank Among GT Opponents
UVA	477	105th	10th
UGA	411	56th	4th
UNC	372	22nd	2nd
VT	346	64th	5th
MTSU	329	94th	7th
Duke	320	113th	12th
Miami	308	83rd	6th
Kansas	291	107th	11th
Air Force	279	103rd	9th
NC State	247	14th	1st
Clem	242	28th	3rd
Wake	209	98th	8th

Ok see here we go again.  Our 2nd and 3rd highest totals all year against the 4th and 2nd BEST defenses we faced.  And our worst game was against the 8th.  We did worse against the 11th and 9th toughest defenses we faced than we did against the 5th, 6th and 7th toughest.  We don’t make any sense.

Opponent	GT Rush Yards	Opponent Run Defense National Rank	Rank Among GT Opponents
Kansas	604	117th	12th
Clemson	383	83rd	8th
MTSU	382	114th	11th
Duke	364	85th	9th
UNC	312	27th	4th
Utah	311	20th	3rd
NC State	296	37th	5th
Maryland	272	111th	10th
UVA	272	48th	6th
VT	243	14th	2nd
UGA	243	11th	1st
Miami	134	68th	7th

A little more order here.  We struggled against the 1st and 2nd toughest defenses, and our best day was against the worst.  But the Maryland game is confusing, and of course, there was another game where a not so good defense (Miami) shut us down.

In fact, in 3 of Coach Johnson’s 4 years, our worst performance of the season came against only the 7th, 8th and 9th toughest run defenses we faced.  (and this does not actually include the Gardner Web game.  I included only FBS teams so we could see a true national rank, but technically in 2008 our worst total of the season was Gardner Web, which is even more mystifying).  

Also of note, two times the defense that shut us down was Miami.  And last year, the Miami defense that shut us down was not very good.  So, I’m not ready to say we are going to run all over Miami just because they are a bad defense on paper.

Teams with great athletes and speed often give us problems.  And Miami still has that. They lack experience, and they are a little undersized, but that is not a huge problem with us.  We are not going to try to overpower you (at least not that much).  So, I expect us to struggle some on offense.  Yes I know I said this last week.  Whoops.  But I really mean it this time.  I am hopeful that we will execute very well, but even if we do I think we’ll only score maybe 35 or so.  Not the 56 nonsense we put up on UVA.  If we don’t execute so well, it will be more like 14 or 17.  Here is hoping we execute.  

Either way though, if our defense plays the way it has been playing, we’ll have a chance to win.  I think Miami’s offense has athleticism more like VT’s than UVA’s.  But nevertheless, we held VT to 7 points through 3 quarters.  I expect we can do the same thing to Miami.  Hopefully, if our offense is sputtering, the defense can close this game out.

The one thing that Miami has that we have not faced yet is a true playmaker at running back.  He is young, but Duke Johnson has really impressed me.  He has excellent speed, good power for his size, and he is shifty enough to make it hard to get a good hit on him.  Most defenders, in space, are forced to try to arm tackle him, and he is too strong for that.  And if you give him a crease, he will usually take it all the way.  Oh and he also returns kicks, so our special teams will need to be ready.

Our defensive front needs to play well.  I think they are better and they will.  We have a lot of speed, especially at linebacker, and we will need it against Duke Johnson.  I think they put more pressure on our defense than UVA did, but ultimately we will keep them from scoring too many points.

I think we win something like 35-17.  This game still terrifies me, for the reasons listed above.  Our offense has at least one mystifying game per year, and its usually to a team like Miami.  And their offense has the playmakers to hurt us if we don’t play sound with our assignments.  But I still think the smart pick is on GT to win comfortably.  We will need to play well.  Here is hoping we do.

Go Jackets!

Week 3 - UVA Review

Well.  Not much to review from that game.  Pretty good effort.  Obviously.  All the way around.  Hard to argue with 600 yards and 56 points.  

I could not be happier with the defense.  We held them to 7 points until garbage time.  Excluding the one TD drive, we held them to 90 total yards and about 4 first downs on their first 9 possessions.  They scored zero points on these 9 possessions.  Two of those drives started at the GT 40 and the GT 20.  We stuffed their rushing attack.  As I stated in the preview, allegedly they have two excellent offensive tackles.  Did not look like it here.  Down 28-7, they tried to run right at us on 3rd and 1, and then again on 4th and 1, from the 11 yard line.  Nothing.  We stopped the run, pressured the QB, and the pass coverage was excellent.  I really have no complaints whatsoever.  If we play defense like that for the rest of the season, we will be in a position to win a lot of games.

Of course, it is to this point unclear how good UVA’s offense is.  They only scored 17 on Penn St.  Penn St. is pretty tough to figure out right now.  They typically play pretty good defense, but then again this year is a little out of the ordinary for them with all the sanctions.  They have lost quite a few players to transfers.  And of course, Virginia’s only other game was against Richmond.  So that does not tell us much.  I guess we will find out as the season progresses.  But the early returns are exactly what I wanted.

Offensively, 210 yards on your first 4 plays from scrimmage is pretty strong.  35 points on 6 drives in the first half.  I guess I could nitpick a little bit.  We did not execute as consistently as I would have liked.  After a 60 yard run got us into the red zone, we had to convert a 3rd and 9, and then needed 4 plays to push in from the 4 yard line.  We had some poor blocking at times.  But, really, that is picky.  You are going to have a bad play here or there most every game.  We hit plenty of big plays, and for the most part executed very well.  

I would like to single out Robbie Godhigh.  First of all, I criticized Godhigh and the other A-backs for poor blocking at VT.  Upon further review, the A-backs mostly did OK at VT.  The blocking issues in Blacksburg had more to do with the WR’s and B-backs.  The A-backs and O-line did not block great, but it was not a major problem either.  

But Godhigh has impressed me thoroughly since then.  He is consistently taking his man out of the play with great blocks.  And often he gets up quickly enough that he nearly has time to block a second man.  I bet, at some point this season, he is going to put 2 guys on the ground on 1 play.  And, probably my favorite play of the game is shown below.  Godhigh literally blocks 3 guys at the same time, with 1 block (he blocks his guy, and knocks him back into a 2nd guy, and then the 2nd guy stumbles and hits a 3rd guy).  Watching live, I was very puzzled.  It initially looked like we missed several blocks on the line.  I thought this play was going nowhere.  Then, Tevin just kinda walks into the end zone.  Had to watch the replay to figure it out.  Oh.  Godhigh took out 3 guys.  Ok.  Cool.  Kid can block.  See below.  

If there was a down side to this game, it would be special teams.  We jumped offsides on a couple extra points.  We gave up a long kickoff return.  We fumbled a punt.  A lot to work on here.  Its frustrating because I had been very pleased with what appeared to be great improvement in the special teams play.  This was a step backwards.  Although I guess an optimist would say that its better to get a few big mistakes out of the way in a game where you have a 40 point lead.  Maybe that was good.  I guess we will see.  But mistakes like that could easily cost us a game or two later in the season if they repeat themselves.

Anyway, overall a great performance.  

Go Jackets.

Week 3 - UVA Preview

I think this week’s preview will be pretty short and sweet, mostly because at this early stage of the season, there is just not much data to analyze.  We have each only played two games, and for both UVA and GT, one of those games was against a clearly overmatched opponent.  So, this will be broad.  

Let’s begin with another video showing how much help we gave them last year.  This game was a particularly lackluster performance for us last year.  I have included only the plays that I consider to be major mental mistakes.  I did not include Tevin’s interception because that was mostly a physical mistake.  I also did not include dumb plays that did not really hurt us.  A good example is the block in the back that negated Orwin’s 66 yard catch and run in the 3rd quarter.  This did not hurt us because without the block in the back, that defender almost certainly makes the tackle.  So it cost us 10 yards, and not 50 as it might first appear.  The format is pretty simple.  I freeze the video at the dumb mistake, and add some text to explain what I’m talking about.  Then I show the play again at regular speed.  

You can’t make those kind of mistakes on the road against a quality opponent.  

Anyway, my prediction for Saturday is a GT win.  The main reason is simply that I thought we were better than UVA last year, and they lost more than we did.  So we should still be better.  In fact, the gap should have widened.  I know we lost last year, but as the video showed, I thought we got in our own way several times.  (yes, UVA made some dumb plays too, and we made others not included in the video.  Both teams always make dumb plays every game.  However, I thought we made more such plays than normal, and the ones we made were more egregious than normal...)  We were favored by about 7 last year, and had both teams played an average game, I think we would have won by about that margin.

Coming into this year, UVA lost a few players from a bad offense, and a bunch of players (3 D-linemen and 3 Defensive Backs) from a pretty good defense.  I expect their defense will still be good, but not as good.  Their offense should still be below average.

At this point, I remain concerned about our offense.  We look out of sync to me.  Not blocking particularly well.  Our timing looks off.  We have people taking false steps.  Nobody moving confidently or with a purpose.  I’m reminded of my high school basketball team.  In practice we would always spend a few minutes “dummying” our offense - ie running our offense with nobody guarding us.  The first team guys could do this quickly and smoothly.  Everybody knew exactly where to go, and they made purposeful cuts and passes.  They did this in games all the time, and thus running it in practice was second nature.  The second team offense was a lot clumsier.  People would forget when to cut and when to screen.  Sometimes a player would go the wrong direction for a half step before realizing.  Etc. 

Right now, our offense looks like the 2nd team.  I guess this makes sense.  Our A-backs and WR’s lack much live experience.  Then again, the O-Line and the QB are generally the positions that need that experience the most.  And we have it there.  I’m a little puzzled.  I expected us to be running pretty smoothly even early in the season.  Oh well.  We aren’t.  We need to improve quickly on this front.  

But I doubt the improvement happens this game.  I don’t think UVA’s defense will be as good as last year.  But it will still be pretty good.  I expect us to struggle early, mostly hit a few good plays but have drives stall out, and probably only get to 21 or 24 points for the game.  I hope to be pleasantly surprised.  

The good news is, 21 or 24 points is all we should need.  I still think our defense is legit.  Its only been one real game, but I have not seen anything to suggest otherwise.  Groh has been saying it.  We look the part.  I’m on board.  Our D-line looks improved.  A little stronger, a little better able to hold the point of attack.  Our linebackers look like serious playmakers.  A lot of speed, good tacklers, and they know where they are going.  They move with a purpose to the right place, and can do some things when they get there.  Our secondary was above average last year.  It is still very good, although like all college secondaries, occasionally has some breakdowns.  But overall, this should be a good unit.  

I’m hoping this year will proceed a lot like 2008.  As you remember, our offense started off pretty sluggish.  We got some ugly, low scoring wins (BC, Clemson) aided by defensive points (safety at BC, pick 6 at Clemson).  But eventually the offense started to click (Miami, UGA).  Hopefully the offense will pick things up faster since this is not the first year of the scheme, as 2008 was.  

Maybe the biggest matchup for this game will be our defensive ends against their offensive tackles.  Their tackles are excellent.  Probably their biggest strength.  Last year they were able to seal the edge and collapse our D-line, and most of their rushing yards came around the corner.  They gained 270 yards on the ground.  They hardly hurt us passing, and when they did, it was on play action, which probably only worked because the run was working so well.  If our defensive ends can compete, we should be ok.  Note I said “compete”.  They probably don’t even need to win this battle.  Just don’t lose it badly.  If they can be competitive, our LB’s should be able to clean up enough plays that we can force UVA into some passing situations, and that should lead to stops.  

I like UVA’s coaching staff.  I think they do a good job overall.  I expect a good game plan.  They certainly had a good game plan for us last year, on both sides of the ball.  But I like our coaches better.  I think we have a slight edge here.  Plus we are at home, and we had the easier game last week.  Athletically, UVA is probably about the same as us.  Maybe we have the slight edge, but its not much.  However, I think when you add up all the factors, this looks like a moderately comfortable win for us.  I think the 10 point spread is about right.  I see a 21-13 or 24-13 GT victory.  As I said, I hope our offense surprises me, but I have not seen anything so far to indicate that we will put up a bunch of points on a good defense at this stage of the season.  

But its been a while since our defense keyed a win over a decent opponent.  That would be refreshing.  I think it happens.

Let’s Go Jackets!

Week 3 - VT and PC Review

Ok so I apologize for being MIA for so long.  Worst.  Blogger.  Ever.  I know.  The Monday night game threw off the schedule.  Didn’t get a chance to review VT like I wanted.  Had a wedding this past weekend (seriously, we are still doing fall weddings?)  And I figured nobody needed analysis of Presbyterian.  I guess it was good to see the season average stat padding 700 yards again, but I think we all knew how that game was going to go.  

On to VT.  After I got over the initial, crushing disappointment (and this took a few days) there actually were some positives.  I was proud of the way we fought.  I thought Tevin played a very good game until the decision at the end.  (Of course, he said he was trying to throw it away, so maybe even that was not really his fault, as he was getting hit when he threw).  Of course I was proud of the defense.  Great game from them for most of the night.  The special teams generally played well, good kickoff coverage, made the field goal, downed a punt deep, capitalized on VT’s awful punt snap.  

But we lost.  What is about GT?  How do we find ways to lose games in the most gut wrenching manner?  44 seconds.  Seriously.  As soon as we scored and I saw the clock all I could think was “oh thats way too much time”.  I mean, I knew the defense had played well.  And 44 seconds is not much.  But I just couldn’t shake that feeling.  Even so we were still basically one tackle away.  Even if they get the first down on 4th and 4, we probably win the game if our secondary makes the tackle the first time.  But we went for the big hit.  The only bad result there is to let him get cleanly past the first defender.  The smart play would have been to wait, and move horizontally to stay in front.  Doesn’t matter if he runs you over and gets an extra 2-3 yards by falling forward.  Doesn’t even matter if the first guy does not make the tackle.  We had plenty of guys in the area, coming to help.  Just slow him down.  But, we go for the big hit, and miss ever so slightly.  But that was enough.  The momentum took the first defender out of the play, and 15 yards down field VT is in comfortable FG range.  Of course we still had a chance in overtime I guess.  

But enough rehashing.  It was a sloppy game.  Looked like the first game for both teams, which it of course was.  Both sides made a lot of mistakes and either side could have won comfortably had they been a little more sharp.  But looking at the big picture, going into Blacksburg, with that many defensive starters returning for VT, and being essentially 1 play from winning and losing in OT is not terrible.  Terribly painful yes, but there are worse losses.  If our guys fight that hard and play that kind of defense and special teams all year, I think we will all be pretty happy with this team.  

The Offense

I’m trying not to be too worried about the offense, but I’ve seen some things that concern me.  VT’s defense is supposed to be loaded.  So maybe its not a problem.  But we were not sharp and did not look good running our base stuff.  And we were not exactly overwhelming against PC early either.  I know we gained 700 yards and scored 59 points eventually, but we were stuffed on 2 of our first 3 possessions.  Did not look very good executing.  Most of our success appeared to me to be simply from overwhelming physical talent.  Presbyterian just could not match up with us.  That won’t work against the rest of our schedule.  We need to be able to execute.

I thought the QB’s have played pretty well.  As I said Tevin had a good game against VT.  Particularly the last drive to put us ahead.  He showed a lot of guts and made some very tough plays.  I did not like Days’ fumble against PC, but Vad Lee looked great.  I was surprised by his speed.  I would not call it breakaway speed, but he was about as fast as PC’s secondary.  That should make him faster than, for example, most linebackers we will face.  As advertised, he appears to be a great passer.  I hope to see him continue to get reps.  We may be onto something here.  

The offensive line has not been as good as I had hoped.  Don’t get me wrong, its been good.  It may still in fact be “the best line since Paul Johnson was hired”, which is what its supposed to be.  But I was hoping it would do better.  I was hoping we would have more success against VT, and certainly that we would come out and manhandle PC.  Neither happened.  In both cases, the blocking by the skill position players may have been more to blame.  But nevertheless, the O-Line has not been as good as I wanted.  I would call it either “pretty good” or “good”, depending on how good VT’s defensive front ends up being.  I was hoping for great.  Maybe they will come around.

The A-backs have some significant ability to run the ball.  I’m excited about that.  However, I am a little concerned about the blocking.  We definitely do not have anybody that blocks as well as Roddy did, at least not right now.  I would even say we don’t have anybody that blocks as well as Peeples, except Orwin (who has been hurt for much of the first 2 games) and maybe Godhigh.  The A-backs have probably been the best blockers out of the skill positions to this point, but thats more indicative of problems elsewhere than of the A-backs doing anything good.  This needs to improve.

The B-backs have largely disappointed me to this point.  Laskey has probably been the best at the fundamentals of the position, although I continue to believe Sims is the best runner and athlete of the bunch.  Perkins is just a mystery.  Not sure when or if things are going to click for him.  Hope they do because I was very high on him based on his high school film.  I hope Snoddy lives up to his potential because it would be great to have a home run hitter there again.  Anyway, the running for the most part has been ok but not spectacular.  None have really blocked all that well.  

The WR’s have been the biggest concern for me, unquestionably.  There was some questionable route running at VT, including at least one example of a WR quitting on his route when he might have had a big play if he runs it out 100%.  But the main issue definitely has been blocking.  We have always had good blockers out there.  Thomas was excellent.  Hill and Melton were very good.  Those guys contributed greatly to our success running the ball.  I have not seen anybody in this group so far who is even adequate.  We left significant yards on the field at VT because of poor blocking on the outside.  Its a big part of our offense, and often is necessary to open up a defense that is concentrating on clogging the middle.  This is an area of significant concern for me moving forward.  

Defense

Overall I’m pretty excited about the defense.  Very good showing at VT.  VT’s offense was far from sharp, but still a lot of that was caused by us.  And outside of a couple of isolated breakdowns, it could have been a GREAT game for the defense.  Plus I thought we were a little unlucky on what was a very weak personal foul penalty to get VT out of 3rd and 12 (sound familiar?  sigh).  And while its hard to tell much from the Presbyterian game, we did hold them to virtually nothing early on.  They gained a total of 4 yards and 1 first down on their first 5 possessions.  That is dominant.  We did not do nearly that well against Western Carolina last year for example.  I think PC had something like 90 total yards through its first 10 possessions.  

The D-Line has pleased me to this point.  I was concerned that we lost 2 out of 3 starters, but I was optimistic about our young depth there.  And so far, it looks like I had reason to be.  They are not perfect, but they did prevent VT’s O-Line from getting much push.  And they were able to generate some pressure on their own.  One factor that should not be overlooked is the height.  We have several guys in the 6’6 or 6’7 range, and that height can really bother the QB if they get anywhere near him.  This happened quite a few times to Logan Thomas.  A lot of arms raised bothering a lot of throwing lanes and vision.  This is not a dominant group, but it is improved and its good enough for us to have a good defense.

The linebackers have been very strong.  I don’t want to get carried away because its early, but I’m very excited by this group.  They can move.  I mean serious speed.  And they are better at moving with a purpose and understanding what they are supposed to be doing.  In short, I think Groh’s prediction that year 3 is when the scheme clicks may turn out to be exactly right.  But unquestionably, this group is athletic.  Maybe the most athletic we’ve had in a while.  

The secondary is talented, and could be quite good.  For the most part they have played well, but did have several unfortunate breakdowns against VT.  Obviously the long TD pass and the last drive, specifically the last play, of regulation.  But there were others.  We have less experience at safety than I’d like, which was a direct cause of the first TD.  But overall the secondary has played well and has the ability to play even better.

I’m pretty psyched about the defense.  I suspect this group might be able to really clamp down on UVA this weekend.  That’s all I will say until the preview, but I’m optimistic that the defense might be back.  The special teams have looked more sound as well.  I hope the offense is not what ends up holding us back.  That would be some frustrating irony.  

Anyway, I will get a UVA preview up sometime this week.  Tough loss to start the season but this team still has a lot to play for, and it may just surprise some people.  The last time we had a good defense and an offense that struggled early was 2008.  That was a pretty good year.  

Let’s Go Jackets!

Week 1 - VT Preview Part 7

We will need to get Orwin plenty of touches tonight.  He is a difference maker, and is supposedly even better than ever after surgery to correct a toe injury.  He has been playing with this injury up to this point, allegedly.  I can’t believe this.  Because look at some of the following plays.  I characterize these as great plays because Orwin gets at least 4 or 5 yards more than a typical running back would get in the same situation.  In some cases, he gets even more.  See here:

The guy is simply a good football player.  

So there you have it.  My formula for a 24-17 GT win is the following - block well, execute the offense, get Orwin plenty of touches, and rely on improved defense and hopefully special teams play with new special teams coach.  I think we get it done.  

Prediction - GT 24, VT 17.

Let’s Go Jackets!